


spiritus sanctus

by meretricula



Category: Ancient History RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-23
Updated: 2015-10-23
Packaged: 2018-04-27 16:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5055898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meretricula/pseuds/meretricula
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The thing in Hadrian's bed doesn't even <i>look</i> like Antinous.</p>
            </blockquote>





	spiritus sanctus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PlinytheYounger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PlinytheYounger/gifts).



If the visions had started sooner, Hadrian would have trusted in them less. Even he would have known (or so he told himself) not to trust his eyes or ears in those first wretched, grief-crazed weeks, when he would have sacrificed all of his empire to have Antinous back again. He could have taken comfort in any shadow of a recollection, no matter how guilty, and discounted it for what it was: the fevered imagination of bereavement. He was a rational man. He was not some superstitious peasant, to place his faith in spirits and the favor of imaginary gods.

"Come back to bed," came the petulant voice behind him, as if on cue. There was nothing seductive about it; it was nothing like the soft, carefully modulated tones enshrined in his memory. Surely, _surely_ if he had conjured up some imagined specter, he would have invented a more pleasant one. “I know you can hear me, you know. You’re being extremely childish, pretending that you can’t.” 

Hadrian turned and faced the hallucination lounging in his bed. It didn’t even _look_ like Antinous, he thought, half-despairing. He remembered Antinous’ dear sweet face. He had been beautiful, of course, but it had never mattered all that much to anyone who met him for longer than a moment or two; his kindness was what had illuminated him, like a lit candle held up behind an unrolled papyrus scroll. The thing in his bed was so beautiful it hurt to look at it. It didn’t even look human. “I don’t believe in ghosts,” Hadrian remarked calmly, his gaze fixed on the tangle of blankets in his bed rather than the creature that sprawled over them. 

“Oh?” the thing asked, smiling, and for a moment it did look almost like Antinous when he had a private joke to share. Hadrian allowed his eyes to be caught on the impossibly sharp curve of its lips and then struggled to drag them away; in only those few seconds, he felt the Antinous in his memories fade and blur while the specter in his bed grew that much more real. With his eyes now focused determinedly on the wall he could still see it in his peripheral vision, stretching its arms up to the ceiling and then collapsing back onto the pillows with languid grace. “I suppose that is your privilege, my dear stubborn Stoic, even if it does manifestly ignore the evidence in front of you. But you were the one who made me what I am, after all. Tell me, Publius: if you don't believe in ghosts, do you believe in gods?”


End file.
